21 posts in this topic

This is just a placeholder for the moment, but also an announcement that I'm working on this and would like all of your advice and input. This post will be used for discussion about tips and tricks for DK DPS and TANKS for the boss encounters in Hellfire Citadel. points of discussion could be useful abilities, talents to take for the fight, and which specs perform strongest.

Hellfire Assault

Blood-

Frost-1h is best here combined with necrotic plague and plague leech. Howling blast until your finger hurts and then plague leech an add for 2 more free howling blasts. The loss of disease is irrelevant because it will either jump from another nearby add or be refreshed with howling blast.

Unholy

All Three- Gorefiends grasp is great for rounding up the adds. From there Defile is a very strong choice to nuke them down. As your difficulty increases switching to necrotic plague becomes more viable as the adds/trash have more health.

Iron Reaver

Blood-Death's Advance all but mandatory. Run artillery to safe distance.

Frost-

Unholy

All Three-Deaths advance is good for running out artillery and getting to bombs during flying phase.

Kormrok

Blood-

Frost- 1H: When the grasping hands are coming move to the outside of the raid and face yourself in. This way you can howling blast down the entire group quickly. Effective when paired with necrotic plague.

UnholySave unholy blight or make sure it is on CD pre grasping hands. Make sure to situate yourself in the middle of your group. Once hands come pop unholy blight and blood boil repeatedly to burn through that phase. Recommended with necrotic plague.

Blood-Tank Gurtogg and Jubei on top of each other for cleaving and decreasing fight time. Also have fel rage person not run away.

Frost-

Unholy

All Three-This will require correct guild execution. When Bloodboil starts rampaging, pop all available CD's and target focus him. He takes increased amount of damage during this period. However, this will require your guild members to correctly position the boss so that he is 25 yards away from Dia Darkwhisper.

Killrog

Blood-Blood Shield from death strike can avoid shred armor debuff leading to indefinite tanking ability with basic rotation

Frost-

Unholy

All Three-Chillbains will slow all adds and you can even use CoI to root the small ones, buying precious time.

Save AMS for Kilrogg's Death Throes, because it helps with the huge amount of AoE damage, and it gives you a lot of RP.

Gorefiend

Blood-you can safely use Chillbains + glyph of BB to spread diseases farther. There is not much movement involved for tanks as for others.

if confortable with damage mitigation death siphon can be helpful during feast of souls for some extra health

Frost- constructs inside gorefiend can be gripped use to prevent them from prematurely escaping

Unholy-constructs inside gorefiend can be gripped use to prevent them from prematurely escaping

All Three-Choosing Deaths advance for this fight is highly recommended. AMZ will help with raid CD weaving during Feast of Souls.

All Three- Gorefiends grasp is all but mandatory. Useful for rounding up small adds for burst cleave.

AMS before bosses use flurry/gaze to avoid getting fel/voidtouched (show us on the dolly where he... nvm)

Tusks of Mannoroth (i'll put proper name later )

Blood-

Frost-

Unholy

All Three-Mass grip can be useful for rounding up adds (be careful)

Death's advance is all but mandatory. Used during shadowforce and empowered shadowforce to not get knocked off the edge

Archimonde

Blood-

Frost-

Unholy

All Three-Deaths advance almost mandatory to help move quickly during allure of flames. AMS during allure is also recommended to help reduce damage and potentially generate RP.

Finally updated (sorry for delay). There will be a noticeable gap when it comes to frost/unholy tips and tricks. DPS wise they are relatively similar and share the same tips and tricks for most part. Beyond all three section not too much differentiation for dps.

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This will require correct guild execution. When Bloodboil starts rampaging, pop all available CD's and target focus him. He takes increased amount of damage during this period. However, this will require your guild members to correctly position the boss so that he is 25 yards away from Dia Darkwhisper.

Kilrogg

Save AMS for Kilrogg's Death Throes, because it helps with the huge amount of AoE damage, and it gives you a lot of RP.

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Gorebound Terror (Felcaster after the transform) Fellfire Volley can be dark simmed: the glyph is extra useful. Note: it deals set amount of damage to every target; obviously the more targets there are, the more effective it is.

Edited June 28, 2015 by simpetar

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You can Dark Simulacrum the Shadow Word: Agony from the Shadowcallers for some insane DPS. Having multiple DK's on this fight enables you to get insane amount of DPS out of it, because every time you cast it, it refreshes its duration and adds a stack. Sample log of what I'm talking about: https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/qdba4HWYtcCwNMB8#fight=14&type=damage-done (We kind of went overboard there xD)

Glyph of Runic Power is useful because of the slowing fire the boss spawns when he charges. Glyph of Dark Simulacrum for spamming SWA more often.

Shadow-Lord Iskar

Blood Boil just before Iskar leaves the platform to spread your DoT's on the spawning adds.

Edited June 29, 2015 by Anfauglith

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You can Dark Simulacrum the Shadow Word: Agony from the Shadowcallers for some insane DPS. Having multiple DK's on this fight enables you to get insane amount of DPS out of it, because every time you cast it, it refreshes its duration and adds a stack. Sample log of what I'm talking about: https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports/qdba4HWYtcCwNMB8#fight=14&type=damage-done (We kind of went overboard there xD)

So, first DK is applying SW:A to the boss and all the following are adding stacks to his application right? So if I'm the only DK in our raid it will not make that huge numbers as I cannot maintain high stack debuff on the boss myself?

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on killrog, glyphed death and decay may help out with slowing adds even more.

on Iskar Death's advance is practically mandatory to hold out on the winds as long as possible. (we by the way used warlocks for portals here and a rogue can run into it fairly long using sprint.)

(UNCONFIRMED) on socrethar I think I saw that less stacks of the debuff (from the construct) were applied while using rune tap as a tank. in general melee dps should aim to always soak the debuff with you anyways, yet when I took one alone and used runetap I only gained 2 stacks as far as I could see.

I will try to cnfirm this if I can. if this is true than maybe IBF would work even better.

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So, first DK is applying SW:A to the boss and all the following are adding stacks to his application right? So if I'm the only DK in our raid it will not make that huge numbers as I cannot maintain high stack debuff on the boss myself?

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Fel Reaver, At least as blood, Death's advance goes a long way for artillery. especially if you're 2 tanking on heroic since boss will be using artillery in quite fast succession. this makes it so the boss doesent move so much (Ive seen a bunch of pugs actually 3tankiing this encounter on heroic to minimise boss movement.)

Xhul'horac: Gorfiends grasp is practically mandatory imo. if you have 2 or 3 dks grasping the small adds ever time they start casting you prevent almost any fel orb cast coming off.

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I had some success with Death Siphon. It helps during Feast of Souls when tank is supposed to soak spirits in the required distance. And during normal phase it gives you another thing to do while chasing adds all over the place. Just make sure that you feel confident enough not to need Death Pact somewhere else in the encounter (e.g. tanking Spirits outside the belly). Not a default recommendation, but worth a consideration.

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Hello all icy Veins DK's,i've just created an account to say to all the people reading that 90% of the tips are bullshit.

Watch logs (warcraftlogs) that will help you to chose the right spec/ talents

worst advice ever: NP on Kormrok

don't use NP on Kormrok as frost Dk ! not enough burst damage, the hands gonna get rekt, even more in HM.

in Mythic if your raid starts green, just don't use defile at pull or Pillar of frost,

keep them for after the jump and cast 2 sec before the hands pop. Stack your Blood Tap and spam Howling Blast 4 to 6 times. don't waste empower rune weapon at Pull because fight is less than 5 minutes. (or 5 max).

2nd hands pop Same, you have to keep defile so watch timers, same for pillar of frost.Empower rune weapon after no Death/ frost rune if hands are not deads if you could stack Rune Tap.

same for Third pop (this is where you should use your Empower rune weapon or just for Bloodlust when you gonna go only MonoTarget).

Be sure to have AMS /ice fortitude/Goule sacrifice with new glyph for the last waves on the room just before the down, gonna be hard time.

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i've just created an account to say to all the people reading that 90% of the tips are bullshit.

Watch logs (warcraftlogs) that will help you to chose the right spec/ talents

worst advice ever: NP on Kormrok

don't use NP on Kormrok as frost Dk ! not enough burst damage, the hands gonna get rekt, even more in HM.

in Mythic if your raid starts green, just don't use defile at pull or Pillar of frost,

keep them for after the jump and cast 2 sec before the hands pop. Stack your Blood Tap and spam Howling Blast 4 to 6 times. don't waste empower rune weapon at Pull because fight is less than 5 minutes. (or 5 max).

2nd hands pop Same, you have to keep defile so watch timers, same for pillar of frost.

Empower rune weapon after no Death/ frost rune if hands are not deads if you could stack Rune Tap.

same for Third pop (this is where you should use your Empower rune weapon or just for Bloodlust when you gonna go only MonoTarget).

Be sure to have AMS /ice fortitude/Goule sacrifice with new glyph for the last waves on the room just before the down, gonna be hard time.

lol these are in general tips and tricks to help out not full raid strategies to implement. Viability of any of these can stagger greatly depending on raid strategy. On lfr, norm, and heroic depending np on korm works great and helps get people on the outliers of teh raid group. Outside of mythic you cannot expect your raid group will have complete mastery of the mechanics and properly stack. Mythic changes everything (its really not an unreasonable idea to do a mythic only tips and tricks). If one does reach mythic progression (which despite the people that claim to on interwebs only 7% of players reach which even then what percent dks will reach?) the raid will largely dictate your individual talent choices based upon group need.

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Archimonde, glyph of bloodboil can potentially cause problems in the last phase if infernals happen to spawn JUST too close to you, when it applies diseases to them, it will be harder for the assigned people to hold them off you to avoid them from stacking.

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Kilrogg - Also Rune Tap keeps you from getting the Shred Armor debuff. If you're tanking Kilrogg make sure to keep an eye out for adds that may have snuk through, as you can grip them in, and slow them, saving your raid from dealing with an unneccessary add.

Chains of Ice works nicely on the smaller adds, especially useful on the Bloods

Socrethar - If you are tanking Socrethar in second phase, position yourself so that you are always within range of gripping the Shadow adds. This leaves dps just worrying about the cleave and not keeping check on when they spawn. If you're not in interrupt rotation on the boss you should use both Mind Freeze and Strangulate to negate the amount of casts going through.

Glyphed DnD may be useful for the ghosts if you are dps, maybe less so as tank as defile makes for smoother damage intake throughout the fight.

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Iskar - (Normal/Heroic) Remorseless Winter is a useful talent to help mitigate some damage the smaller adds do during the first 2 Shadow Escape periods. An aoe snare + stun can really take the pressure off the tanks for a few seconds, particularly so if you single tank this fight on Heroic. Use it when the adds get near you/your tank(s), and the quick CD will be ready for the next group. Not useful for the final group of Priest/Warden/Raven, unfortunately.

Hellfire High Council - (Normal/Heroic) If you get stuck tanking Dia Darkwhisper, your Defile CD will coincide almost perfectly with her Nightmare Visage usage. Wait until she stops casting the ability, drop Defile, and then just reactively Death Strike whenever you're hit. The Blood Shields you generate from reactive Death Strikes will enable you to get through this phase without the use of any other defensive CDS. Your Mind Freeze + Anti-Magic Shell + Reactive Death Strikes will make absorbing the Shadow Bolt phases cake too. Just keep your diseases up, roll Death Coils when you have the RP for them, and let your Death Strikes make tanking this part of the fight simple.

Fel Lord Zakuun - (Normal/Heroic) (Blood) I'm a massive fan of reactive Death Strikes in this fight, particularly in the Unarmed parts and Phase 3. The Blood Shields and healing you can gain from allowing DS to be a reaction instead of part of your rotation can really go a long way to surviving. Couple this approach with Defile for the above periods of the fight as well Glyph of Regenerative Magic to either protect a pillar or simply lessen damage to yourself if a pillar or player is struck by a wave. You can also get away with alternative glyph choices here, because there is nothing else for Blood Boil to hit. Glyph of Raise Ally is a decent choice here just in case you need to Battle Rez someone and you don't have or don't want to spend the RP on it.

Mannoroth - (Normal/Heroic) Your Death Grip and Gorefiend's Grasp make you an excellent Infernal position-er. Assuming you aren't actively tanking at the time, you can run off to the side and DG a badly placed Infernal away from yourself/melee/raid, or use GG to move multiples into better position all at once. I'd also recommend Glyph of Blood Boil on this fight to spread your diseases to the Imps and Infernals for a bit extra damage on these. Glyph of Regenerative Magic for some extra protection/extra Runic Power during the Fel Hellstorms; AMS should be up for each Fell Hellstorm. AMS can also be used to help take some of the pressure off the healers during the raid-wide Shadowforce in P4.

(Blood) you can get a massive heal + Blood Shield if you time a Death Strike right when you are hit (and thrown back) from Massive Blast. It should heal you almost the full amount you lost from the hit itself, which is particularly handy if your co-tank is a bit slow on the taunt swaps, or if you find yourself having to handle Mannoroth solo for a while because your other tank died.